Rising costs of living are causing struggles for some Arizona residents, with minimum wage earners most acutely impacted. SmartAsset’s newest study examines how far the minimum wage goes in Arizona, and the other 49 states. 

Among the study’s key findings: 

  • Arizona ranks No. 9 for the percentage of the local living wage which a worker earning the state minimum ($15.15 in Arizona)  brings home — 62%. 
  • In Arizona, the living wage is $50,898, while the annualized minimum wage is $31,512. The median income, meanwhile, is $50,926. 
  • Missouri has the nation’s strongest minimum wage. There, a worker earning the state minimum earns 71% of the local living wage. By nominal dollar value, Washington has the nation’s highest state minimum wage, beginning at $17.13 per hour. 

Minimum wage laws expanded during the Great Depression to support a basic standard of living, but their value today depends on local costs. A relatively high minimum wage may still fall far short in an expensive state, while a lower minimum wage may cover a larger share of basic expenses in areas where costs are lower. In some states, the minimum wage approaches a living wage — the income needed to maintain a basic but adequate lifestyle. In others, the gap is wider, leaving workers with greater difficulty covering essential expenses.

SmartAsset analyzed minimum wages in all 50 states, comparing them with 2026 living-wage levels to determine where minimum-wage earnings go furthest. For each state, the analysis also calculated the Kaitz index, which expresses the annualized minimum wage as a share of the median wage. The results reveal where a minimum-wage paycheck comes closest to supporting a viable living and where workers face the steepest shortfall.

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Key Findings

  • Missouri has the nation’s strongest minimum wage relative to living costs. Although the Show Me State’s $15-per-hour minimum wage is far from the nation’s highest, it comes closest to covering the local living wage. Working full time, minimum-wage workers earn $31,200 annually, or about 71% of the state’s $44,242 living wage. Nebraska ranks second, followed by Connecticut.
  • New Hampshire has the nation’s weakest minimum wage relative to living costs. The Granite State sets its minimum wage at the federal rate of $7.25 per hour. A full-time minimum-wage worker earns just 28.1% of the state’s living wage. 
  • Massachusetts stands out among the 10 most expensive states. Among the 10 states with the highest living wages, it is the only one where annual minimum-wage earnings cover less than half, at 49%.
  • By nominal dollar value, Washington has the nation’s highest state minimum wage. The statewide rate is $17.13 per hour, though exceptions apply: Employers may pay 14- and 15-year-olds 85% of the minimum wage, while Seattle’s minimum wage is $21.30 per hour, and some smaller suburbs have even higher rates. 
  • Up to 14 states compare favorably to international averages. The Kaitz Index measures the ratio of the minimum wage to an area’s median wage. Across 30 nations with minimum wage laws in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) — a group of primarily high-income, developed nations — that ratio is 0.56. Up to 14 U.S. states meet or exceed that ratio on this study’s basis. They are Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, Oregon and Rhode Island.* 

* The OECD benchmark is conventionally measured against the median earnings of full-time workers, whereas the state ratios use BLS OEWS medians covering all wage and salary jobs, including part-time work, so state ratios may run higher than a like-for-like comparison would show, and the count of states at or above 0.56 should be read as an upper bound.